Fashion has been beefing up its environmental conscience (if not its models) over the past few years—and with good reason. The production, transport, and disposal of clothing is a serious source of pollution, with the textile industry holding steady as the third largest consumer of water, and the source of up to 20 percent of industrial pollution.
This year, it’s fabric dye that’s getting the Green treatment. Coloring a pound of fabric can take up to 75 gallons of water, and a single dress or pair of pants can use up to 25 gallons.
So what if we could dye all our clothes without water? That was the idea tackled by Colorep, a California-based technology development company that created a new way to color fabric using air rather than H2O. Called AirDye, the process applies non-plastisol-based inks within garment fibers, rather than as a layer on top (which is how it’s done with water).
This Fashion Week (yup, it’s going on now—you can tell by all the hungry-looking Eastern European waifs roaming the streets) the AirDye system made its debut at the Costello Tagliapietra show, in which the clothes (see photo) were dyed almost entirely without water.
Granted, until this new dyeing method hits jeans and T-shirts, your DISCOVER staff likely won’t be testing it out ourselves.
Related Content:
Discoblog: New Jewelry Could Help Diabetics, Eliminate Syringes
Discoblog: How to Make Solar Chocolate Chip Cookies on Your Car Dashboard
Discoblog: Are “Climate Friendly” Food Labels a Terrible Idea?
Image: Courtesy of LLR Consulting
September 16th, 2009 at 2:04 am
A very cool new handbag line is using AirDye in all of its production and materials. It’s JulieApple (http://www.julieapple.com), which was recently launched by Julianne Applegate, who was previously a key designer with Le Sportsac, before striking out on her own. Her bags are gorgeous, green as can be, and totally affordable. I’m a big fan of the JulieApple line, so I figured I’d let folks interested in finding apparel and accessories that are created using AirDye know about the company.
September 16th, 2009 at 4:32 am
[...] ofta kan se bleka och tråkiga ut; ekologiskt och klara färger går inte ihop. Tills nu. Discover rapporterar nämligen att ett amerikanskt företag (Colorep) har kommit på en teknik att färga plagg helt [...]
September 18th, 2009 at 11:11 am
[...] @ 8:11 am Tags: art, clothing, color, fashion, technology Science makes an appearance at Fashion Week this week (on Disco Blog): This year, it’s fabric dye that’s getting the Green treatment. [...]